Emmy Category Analysis: Supporting Actress in a Limited Series

by Cláudio Alves

If you need proof that the current Emmy voting system is broken, you need to look no further than the Supporting Actress in a Limited or Anthology Series race. Despite having seven available slots, only two shows appear in the lineup. Unsurprisingly, they are The White Lotus and Dopesick, two of the year's biggest frontrunners. Allowing voters to check an unlimited number of names on their ballots means that the most popular and acclaimed programs will dominate, no matter the specifics of the category. Unfortunately, this takes away slots to honor MVP achievements in less buzzy shows.

For predicting purposes, it also muddies the waters...

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Some Thoughts on "The White Lotus"

by Eric Blume

With the Emmy Awards ahead of us this coming weekend, it seems like a good time to start discussing a show that will likely make a killing at next year's Emmys, Mike White's HBO show The White Lotus.  It's been the talk of the industry this summer, and rightfully so, as there's nothing quite like it.  This intense ensemble comedy-drama-satire-tragedy is incredibly dense, so to start off the discussion, I thought I'd offer just a few of the very difficult things that writer-director Mike White accomplished with such intelligent success...

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Yes No Maybe So: "Promising Young Woman"

by Lynn Lee

Could this be Carey Mulligan’s year?  When the first trailer for Promising Young Woman hit theaters last December, this viewer, at least, immediately sat up and took notice.  Mulligan plays emphatically against type as a modern-day nemesis aptly named Cassandra, self-packaged as a poisoned bonbon of sexual pliability, and spurred to vengeance by an unpunished rape that caused her to drop out of medical school.  Reviews at Sundance affirmed the power of Mulligan’s performance, and the movie seemed poised to remind the world that she’s still a formidable actress who deserves way more attention than she’s received since her breakout Oscar-nominated turn in An Education. 

Then the pandemic happened, and PYW’s release—originally set for April— was indefinitely pushed back.  Now it’s rescheduled for Christmas Day, and the movie poster and a second trailer have dropped.  Will it be enough to get Mulligan in the 2020 awards conversation?  Let’s break the trailer down, YNMS style...

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Carey Mulligan Hunts Bad Men

by Murtada Elfadl

When I recently listed five films premiering at January’s Sundance I’m most anticipating, Promising Young Woman didn’t make the cut. But then they went and released a most thrilling trailer. In lieu of YES NO MAYBE SO, since I’m 120% yes I will list 5 reasons to get excited about this movie...

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The Furniture: Beatriz at Dinner in a Tacky Muted Mansion

"The Furniture," by Daniel Walber, is our weekly series on Production Design. You can click on the images to see them in magnified detail.

Beatriz at Dinner is a film of climaxes, moments of outrage that burst through the veneer of respectability cultivated by the rich and amoral. Beatriz (Salma Hayek), overwhelmed with disgust at a picture of Doug (John Lithgow) and the body of a recently-murdered rhinoceros, throws his phone at him and storms out. Laughing at her principles, he looks at his hosts and asks, “Does she get out much?”

This, of course, is a central irony of Miguel Arteta and Mike White’s tightly-wound send-up of American wealth. Doug is the CEO of Rife Worldwide, an internationally-reviled real estate firm. He’s a Trumpian nightmare of toxic masculinity and unbridled capitalism, breaking laws and displacing communities as a best business practice. And so when he asks this question, we are reminded that his life is spent constructing hideous monuments to tackiness that replicate a precise vision of high-end living no matter the context...

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